Skull Island

 Oh the many things we enjoy as family (well, as father and son) on Netflix. You might remember that I blogged last year about an animated series freely based on King Kong.Since then, Wolfie has developed a fascination for big apes in general and King Kong in particular. We were happily surprised to find out this year a new animated series called Skull Island, apparently based on Kong: Skull Island, which I haven't seen. As Wolfie and I are always in need of monkey action, especially with giant apes (gorillas?), we watched it and pretty much binged it in a week or so. We enjoyed it a lot. I was hesitant at first, because some of it is surprisingly gory for a kids show, but Wolfie didn't get scared and wanted to see it all. And we did. Sadly, the first season ends on a cliffhanger with lots of loose ends. And there is no second season in sight for now. Apparently the second season has been scripted, but I have no idea what will be the release date, if there is one. Still, we have enough to keep us busy: I have yet to show Wolfie the original movie.

Kong: King of the Apes

Sometimes I try to convince Wolfie to watch something different, just so I can enjoy watching it with him. And sometimes we thus make happy discoveries. I stumbled on an animated series on Netflix, Kong: King of the Apes, freely based on, well, King Kong. It was a short lived series, lasting only two seasons from 2016 to 2018 and I understand it was neither popular nor critically acclaimed, that said we did enjoy it. It is not without its flaws, it might even be bad: the animation is not great, the story is very derivative and cliché ridden, with an environmental message that is hammered in with no subtlety whatsoever. But hey, it's a children cartoon and it has a giant gorilla fighting mecha monsters and so on. And the giant gorilla is freaking King Kong, so it cannot be all that bad. It's just like perfect matinee fun. I know this is not the only Kong cartoon and I hope to watch them all with Wolfie. Eventually, I will show him the original movie.

Singe au musée

Mon père m'a envoyé il y a quelques mois des photos prises au Musée national des beaux-arts du Québec. Dont celle-ci. C'est peut-être un bonobo, un chimpanzée, voire un gorille, bien qu'il me semble un peu maigre pour être un gorille. Qu'en pensez-vous? Je le trouve très authentique, dans tous les cas.

Un gorille

Photo prise dans l'Isle of Wight, à Robin Hill pour être exact. Robin Hill est un parc pour enfants que petit loup a beaucoup aimé. On y trouvait notamment de faux et de vrais animaux, dont des faux gorilles qui avaient l'air très vrais. Celui-ci en tout cas nous a beaucoup impressionnés. Par une journée chaude (beaucoup trop chaude) d'été, nous avions l'impression d'être quelque part en Afrique. S'il avait bougé, je n'aurais pas été étonné.

Face to face with a gorilla

We,, not quite, but it was very close. So as you know, we went to the London Zoo yesterday. There was a section for gorillas, which like for many others, we could barely see the inhabitants. There is a passage above the visitors, which is covered with glass and makes any gorilla passing by very visible. So once we just looked above and there he was. At first I thought it was a fake one, like an animatronic gorilla, but no, he started moving and... Well, it gives you a quick fright, yet leaves you in awe. The intelligence you can see in these eyes. I really felt a kinship with apes at that moment.

Jungle Animals?

I took this picture last year. One of my colleagues had bought this for her son. Something struck me and being sort of academic about these kinds of things, I mentioned it right away: "This display is all wrong: elephants, giraffes and lions live in the savanna, not the jungle, and tigers don't even live on the same continent!" I could have added that the elephant seemed to be an Asian one. Anyway, one of my colleague teased me about this and said: "I can imagine you refusing to buy your son such a set, because it's not accurate". I would, but would also tell him that these are not all jungle animals. Anyway, I thought that what he said was funny enough to be a great unknown line. Even though I am right.